


ofiowanlies asked you:

by slashsailing



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Flirting, Fluff, Internet, M/M, Online Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-02
Updated: 2013-12-02
Packaged: 2018-01-03 06:25:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1067145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slashsailing/pseuds/slashsailing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story wherein, Leonard gets an anonymous message on tumblr and may or may not develop an internet crush with some boy who turns out to run a hipster blog from a farm in Iowa.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ofiowanlies asked you:

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Of Black Coffee and Dumb Blogs](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1054436) by [shiptoomuch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shiptoomuch/pseuds/shiptoomuch). 



It all begins with an anonymous message.

> **I think your blog is rad.**

It makes Leonard smile despite himself, he gets the occasional anon, and has immersed himself enough in his array of fandoms that there is a little network of people that he chats with. They never fail to make him pretty chuffed.

> **I think _you’re_  rad.**

Leonard grins at his own brilliance and clicks  _publish_.  He doesn’t really think much of it, one of his favourite fellow Tolkien nerds like the post and he continues scrolling through the comic-con tag and liking various gif-sets from whatever panels he can. Just seeing Andrew Garfield makes him excited for the summer. Not to mention the fact that he hates the slight chill in the Mississippi air.

He folds a leg under him; he’s sitting at his desk, because he should be writing an assignment for his chemistry class, and he does click onto his word document, stares at the essay rubric, scoffs, and clicks back onto chrome, refreshing his dashboard and surprised, and automatically excited, to see a little red ‘1’ over the little envelope item.

**goingtothechapel asked you:**

> **Anonymous admirers? I remember when you were a nobody trying to write awkward Wolfstar fanfiction.**

Leonard scoffs, Christine was one of his first followers and he has absolutely no idea where she found him but he’s thrilled she did. Her blog has evolved a lot over the last three years but they’ve done a lot for each other in terms of promos and such, so much so that Leonard no longer reblogs the ‘who do you ship me with’ meme because all the responses are Christine. Even though Leonard is openly gay.

> **I damn well deserve them ;) and don’t bring up my HP phase, it’s not fair.**

He answers privately and returns to his dash. He reblogs a few particularly awesome  _Almost Human_  graphics, an old photograph of a young Jude Law and a well written Will/Hannibal head-canon, but his dorm room is kind of cold and so he gets up to close his window, pulling on a soft blue sweatshirt and scowling at his chemistry textbook. It’s mocking him, he swears to God.

> **It’s so damn cold in this room, first they make me sit in inane lectures and now they subject me to sub-degree temperatures. God knows how I’m meant to do this damn essay.**

He posts it with an unamused House gif and leaves it at that. A couple of usual suspects like it, and it’s nice – it feels like there is a little circle of them that all care about each other, these people probably know more about him than most of his fellow students. It’s one of the nicest feelings ever. Not that his grumpy heart would admit it. A med-student that he follows, in genuine awe, called Phil or doctorfeelgood, because he likes ‘classic-rock’, among other things, just replies with a deprecating smiley and:

          **Just wait until you’re doing your residency, Leo.**

Geoff, who he may or may not have an internet crush on, also replies.

          **Is there any way we can keep you from complaining? ;)**

Leonard doesn’t blush because he’s an adult. Well, he’s eighteen at least and that means he can vote and live on his own in a freezing cold dorm room. So he’s definitely  _not_  blushing. Instead he sets about finding a fresh theme and editing his about me page, adding a few more blogs to his favourites and trying to organise his fic recs in a more logical fashion.

His new about me page consists of:

> _Things you might like to know?_
> 
> _I’m Leonard, a miserable freshman at Ole Miss’ who tries his damned hardest to do work but mostly just spends his time on tumblr complaining about it and burrowing himself in homoerotic Fanfiction. I mean, if you don’t have Fanfiction, what do you have?_
> 
> _If you’re here for a while, you’re likely to see Almost Human, Hannibal, Dexter… and because I’m doing pre-med I like to torture myself with House and Grey’s Anatomy (AND SCRUBS BECAUSE OMG I HOPE THE ER WILL BE LIKE THAT). Generally it’s just a mishmash of my nerdy life, beware of comic-book meta and my eternal tears over fictional characters._

His new theme is simple and he edits the code to make a few much needed edits, selects his trademark pencil-drawing skeletal print to serve as his sidebar and takes a new selfie because he really will do anything to prevent having to start that essay.

When he clicks back to his dashboard he has an exciting ‘4’ above his envelope but he replies to Phil and Geoff first, it’s only polite.

 ** doctorfeelgood  ** **replied to your post “ It’s so damn cold in this room…”**

> **Just wait until you’re doing your residency, Leo.**

**If I ever get that far, Christ, I hate college.**

** geoffreylecter ** **replied to your post “ It’s so damn cold in this room…”**

> **Is there any way we can keep you from complaining? ;)**

**You can certainly try, Geoff, warming me up is probably the place to start ;)**

He posts his replies and then clicks open his asks.

**goingtothechapel asked you:**

> **Please, your HP phase is the only reason I follow you :D**

Leo shakes his head but deigns not to reply; he’ll fill her Almost Human prompt instead and make her flail right out of the window. Then he definitely will do his chemistry assignment.

**anonymous asked you:**

> **I’d be happy to keep you warm ;)**

Leo looks at it and scoffs, he immediately thinks it’s probably someone he knows being little shits because they can but then you can never take these things for granted. Especially when he sees the next ask.

**anonymous asked you:**

> **[whispers] sorry if that was creepy, it wasn’t meant to be creepy.**

It wasn’t creepy, not really. It’s tumblr, nothing’s really  _creepy_  anymore. Besides, it’s always sweet to get anonymous attention. Leo decides to respond to the first ask because it makes the most sense.

> **Anytime, darlin’.**

It’s simple and it’s sassy and everyone loves it when he types Southern. He also hopes the endearment will settle the anons nerves. The final ask is from another one of his mutual follows informing him that she’s starting a rewatch of Bones if he fancies it.

> **Nyota, you know I love you, right? Let me know when you wanna start, we’ll draw up a schedule :p**

He replies to that one privately and then reopens his word tab. He turns on his lamp too, in a futile attempt to make him focus, he reads over the chapter. It’s difficult to resist putting it down and opening his browser again but if he gets it read, he’ll have the damn essay written in an hour. It’s only got to be a thousand words.

He writes his hundred word introduction, pre-emptively makes his two source bibliography and then opens chrome again. He’s got a reply from Nyota telling him to Skype her tomorrow because she’s off to class, she studies at UCLA but she’s spending the first semester of her junior year in Europe as part of her degree and it means their internet time clashes slightly.

He’s also got another anon.

> **You literally make me die, you’re accent _gah_ … you are not for real.**

It sounds like a good thing, and it’s probably the same anon as the one from before. So Leonard takes the compliment with a pleased little smile.

> **I am one-hundred percent the real McCoy (pun intended) an’ I’m insulted that you’d doubt my validity. Also, don’t die! Your anons are gettin’ me through the night.**

He publishes it and then clicks back into his word document, writes another hundred or so words and clicks back to tumblr, hoping to see a little red ‘1’. He does and he grins.

> **Well I’m glad to be of service ;)**

Leo doesn’t know how to reply, so he leaves it in favour of his essay and then reblogs a few ask memes, he’s slowly working his way through answers and such when he gets another anon from a familiar type tone.

> **Is it weird to wanna know everything? I’ll try to control myself:** **4, 22, 31, 40 + 41**

Leonard smiles at his anon’s enthusiasm and opens his tumblr to check what the questions the numbers correspond to.

> **Control is overrated. I’ll tell you whatever you wanna know. But I’ll answer your questions first ;)**
> 
> **4\. What do you love about yourself?** I guess I like how independent I am, I’ve always done stuff for myself and I like to think I use my common sense and am managing to survive on my own two feet pretty well, so uh, yeah.  **22\. Do you believe in fate/destiny?** I’m meant to be a man of science so I guess I should say no, but a part’a me would like to think there is some sort of guiding force – makes the universe less damn lonely.  **31\. What gender do you prefer?** This is part of the ‘loviedovie’ section, so ah, guys, in that respect.  **40\. Could you fall in love online?** I dunno, I mean I’ve made some really good friends online and they’re just as important as rl friendships, so theoretically yes, although it’d be a damn shame not to ever get to meet them…  **41\. How much of an age gap can you handle?** Uh, I dunno, a couple of years either side I suppose, probably a few more years older than me than younger – just because like, I don’t wanna date a  _thirteen_  year old.

He tags the ask with ‘thanks my new favourite anon’ and leaves it at that. He makes a text post telling everyone it’s eleven pm and he needs to get his essay finished but that he’ll be back tomorrow, their ever-faithful servant.

Leonard and his new anon, who’s started to prefix all his asks with #JTK, talk a lot over the next few days. And yes Leonard has trawled through his followers, all 1,701 of them, to try and find out who this anon might be. It’s unsuccessful, mostly because Leonard gives up after the first couple of pages.

> **You should come off anon because I wanna be able to talk to you without addressing the damn masses.**

He has to make it as a text post, tagging ‘please’ and ‘JTK’ in the hopes the guy, because they’ve established this much at least, sees it sometime before Leonard has to sleep. He’s not only dying from the curiosity but his interest is genuinely piqued, maybe because this guy has remained anon – like all Leonard can wonder is what has he got to hide. Loads of his regular followers like it and he gets a few asks offering tips and possible ways to lure JTK out of his anonymity.

**ofiowanlies asked you:**

> **How could I say no?**

Leonard’s heart starts to race, and it’s completely ridiculous but true nonetheless. He clicks on the link and it taken to a tumblr with a simple multi-column layout. It looks like a hipster blog. Leonard snorts but scrolls down the page, there are a lot of photos and facts about space, a lot of astronomy graphics and cool photos of the sky in various states of the day… there are old pictures of actors, a lot of candid movie-set shots and quotes from books and famous people. But no bruised knees of pictures of cannabis so maybe it’s not as bad as he first thought. He clicks on the about.

> _Hey guys, I’m James, or Jim. Jim is probably better. I’m sixteen and I like astronomy. I live on a farm, we have ducks and a pond and I get very emotional about the movie ‘Fly Away Home’ as a result. I don’t really know what else you’d wanna know, but if you have a burning question you can always visit my ask box. I don’t bite (and here is the customary) unless you want me to._

Leonard smiles to himself at that and he knows what his ask is going to be before he’s even clicked on the ‘ask’ tab.

> **Fly Away Home was about geese ;)**

He forgoes clicking follow and instead returns to his dashboard, clicking ‘tumblr’ every few minutes until the familiar little one resides over the envelope.

> **I knew you’d have to say something about that :D Is your curiosity sated now? ;)**

Leonard quickly types out his reply and clicks to answer privately.

> **Not really, first I can’t figure out why you’d ever follow me... you’re way too sophisticated for my dorkish ramblin’. Also I was kinda hoping for a few selfies, but alas, 5ever disappointed.**

Jim’s reply doesn’t take long to come.

> **You’re one-hundred percent my shame blog, my guilty pleasure ;) Don’t let the photography put you off, under this hipster veneer beats the heart of a nerd, I stg. That’s why I kept on anon, figured you’d only be confused if some random hipster started fawning all over you.**
> 
> **And as for the selfies: tagged/moi – don’t say I never did anything for you ;)**

So Leonard clicks back to Jim’s tumblr, adds tagged/moi to his url and is greeted by rows of pictures. He lets out a low sound of appreciation and then feels like a complete creep and subconsciously looks around his empty dorm. Even though there’s no one else there, he feels the need to pull his laptop closer up his thighs. Maybe it’s to get closer to the gorgeous face he’s being presented with. The kid has a dusty blonde fauxhawk in most of the pictures, buzzed at the side and nicely stylised on top. He wears thick, typically hipster rims though and jumpers that are way too big for him, or, alternatively, awful-print, thick-cotton shirts that are close fitting, buttons done all the way up. There is the occasional appearance of a NASA-logo mug, and sometimes he’s smoking.

It’s pretty much the eyes that kill Leonard, though. They are beyond blue, and it makes the slight brush of acne cheeks and jaws go practically unnoticed. Leonard likes the easiness of his gaze, the way the pictures are predominantly in the same position, Jim cross legged on what Leonard assumed to be his bed, head ducked in slightly so he can fit in shot.

He’s skinnier than Leonard would usually go for, Leonard’s only experience is with guys a bit older than him, and usually it means they’re a bit more built than him.

 _Woah_ , Leonard frowns, stopping himself,  _that’s jumpin’ the gun a bit_.

 _Could you fall in love online?_ The question swims around his head and he clicks off of Jim’s page pointedly. He stares at his dash blankly for a minute before aggressively reblogging a post about having sex with Chris Hemsworth.

It makes him think of Jim.

> **Fawn as much as you want.**

Leonard starts to type. It’s meant to sound jokey but now it just sounds flirty. So he backspaces and tries to start again.

> **Are you _really_  a nerd though? What fandoms do we share? Not that I’m sceptical, but hipsters are a pretty tricksy bunch. And you know what they say about lyin’ blue eyes – or maybe that’s just a country thing.. Is my Georgia showin’? ;)**
> 
> **You’re selfies certainly don’t disappoint. But as a wannabe-doctor I have to tell you that smoking will cause you a slow and painful death and your eye balls will bleed. Be warned.**

He sends it, hoping its playful enough without being flirty because he’s not sure if he wants to this whole internet crush thing, especially seeing as though he’s pretty sure Jim has already admitted, in about ten different round-about ways, that he likes him. He even calls him Bones sometimes because of Leonard’s background and his constant meta about the show.

> **Okay so Bones and CSI are a given, right? And don’t think I don’t read your Almost Human prompt fills because I do. You remind me of John actually, a more adorable, younger John. That has to be the best compliment I can give.. Blue eyes certainly help but I’m typing so you can’t get the full force of my charm.**
> 
> **You’re missing out.**
> 
> **And my selfies are awkward but I am suitably warned. Hipster 5ever though ;)**

Leonard laughs and cringes slightly at the fact that Jim reads his shitty attempts at Fanfiction. He’s a med-student, dammit, not a writer. Christine makes him do it, says he’ll be able to write the most realistic smut. And yeah, maybe it’s an endeavour that most people seem to enjoy but he gets so embarrassed when people bring it up.

> **You read my smut? [goes off to die in a desert somewhere] omg kill me now. Is it because we’re both moody and irascible but also damn well hilarious because then I’m totally takin’ it as a compliment.**

He doesn’t add anything about Jim’s pretty blue eyes or his totally not-awkward selfies and tries to go about actually doing some blogging. That lasts for about five minutes until he’s greeted by another ‘1’ and he just resigns himself over to the fact he’s basically just here for Jim at the moment and everything else will just have to wait.

> **You write awesome smut *shrugs* I’m not gonna _not_  read it.  And no, it’s because you’re both smoking (hot) - not literally smoking – we’ve talked about that already.**

Leonard feels like he shouldn’t be grinning to himself the way he currently is. But he can’t help himself.

> **Imagining you readin’ my smut is literally makin’ me blush like a beet. It’s unsightly. An’ I’m unsightly and slightly concerned that you’re not wearin’ your glasses rn.**

He waits, cracking his knuckles.

> **The modesty is just ‘cause you’re Southern, if you can’t see you’re a total hottie then it is you, good sir, who needs glasses. My frames are working just fine, thanks.  And I’m glad I can make you blush. Victory! And payback because imagine the blush on my face when I’m reading the stuff.**

Leonard genuinely laughs and then gives into the temptation to flirt.

> **You’re frames certainly _are_  working just fine ;)  _Lookin’_ fine, anyways. You’re a bad influence, d’you know that? And they do say payback is fair turnabout so *shrugs* you can have my blushes.**

Jim isn’t too slow at replying, like maybe he’s waiting for Leonard’s replies too.

> **[gasps] Bones! Are you _hitting_  on me?  ~~(I hope so.)~~ I can’t be the bad influence, I’m the young one here. It’s all your fault, I’ve been corrupted by your Jorian smut.**

Leonard thinks about Jim thinking about him in all the various positions of pleasure Leonard’s written John into over the last few weeks. He smirks. He also takes the time to look up the legal age of consent in Iowa. It’s sixteen. He feels slightly reassured.

> **You’re making me feel dirty (and not in the good way). Maybe I’ll only write fluff from now on to try an’ atone for my sins.**

Leonard smirks at Jim’s speedy reply.

> **You better not, you tease. And maybe, if you feel dirty you should take a shower. A cold shower ;) don’t be hesitant to post wet selfies.**

“Infant.” Is Leonard’s only response before he types out his reply.

> **You’re sixteen, I feel like I didn’t even know what smut was when I was sixteen. Or if I did I’m pretty sure it was bad Drarry on ff.net... You kids have it so good nowadays.**

He laughs at his trademark old man routine and waits for Jim’s response, opening his drafts to finish off a prompt he started yesterday.

> **_Please_ , you act like you’re ninety :p I’m only two years younger than you, I’m not six.**

_And you certainly don’t look six,_ Leonard thinks.

> **You ever listen to the song Jailbait? ;)**

He leaves it at that and finally gets his prompt fill finished, posting it, when he returns to his first tumblr tab he’s got a reply from Jim.

> **Are you saying you only want me for a one night stand? I’m hurt, Bones.**

Leonard doesn’t know how to reply to that… Is he meant to joke about it, is he meant to reassure Jim? What does he want? An illicit affair with a sixteen year old hipster? Maybe… Over the internet? He’s not sure.

But Jim is really pretty. And he hits all of Leonard’s blue-eyed-blonde markers.

> **You’re gonna kill me, kid. But with baby blues like yours I think I could stretch to more than one night. Maybe when you’re no longer jailbait.**

Jim’s reply comes quick enough, after Leonard has replied to some comments left on his new fic.

> ***pouts* you’re a tease, I’ll be seventeen in March though so watch this space ;)**

Bones smiles. Looks at the clock and hates that he has to go, but he has class in twenty minutes and he needs to get all the way across campus.

> **I’ll be watchin’ intently. I’ve gotta head to class but I’ll be back later.  I hope you enjoy the new prompt fill ;) (I have a feelin’ you will).**

The prompt was “let’s have a story about Dorian ‘putting it somewhere else’” and thus of course, John being fingered obviously ensued. Leonard is kind of desensitised to his own smut but he hopes Jim isn’t.

After class, when he’s back in his dorm and checks his activity he sees Jim’s icon and the little blue and white speech bubble overlapping it with:

**ofiowanlies replied to your post “anonymous prompt: let’s have a story about…**

> **[fans self] I wish I didn’t know you.**


End file.
